Sometimes Goodbye is a Second Chance
by KaitanAtreides
Summary: Time-travel. Hunter-nin Uzumaki-Namikaze Naruto accidentally overloads a quick-rewind jutsu during a mission. Canon-ish up to Fourth Shinobi World War. Most definitely not after he uses the jutsu.
1. How the Hell I Got There

A/N: My brain is so weird! I've been reading a bunch of time travel fics, and this popped into my head. Anyway, I know there's no Konoha Oinin, they're unique to Kiri, but everyone else does it...

Also, since the leader of a village that's not one of the Big Five isn't a Kage, what are they? Anything in specific?

A certain boy known as Uzumaki or Namikaze Naruto was rather annoyed. In his time in the Hunter-nin, the seventeen-year-old blonde was not liking how many times missing-nin broke his mask or managed to hit him with a jutsu that killed anyone without Kyuubi-healing. Like that super-massive lightning sphere, or those laser bolts, or the fire that was covering every inch of his body. So he was working on a new space-time ninjutsu that would allow him to rewind time several seconds and then prevent whatever was going to kill him- well, kill anyone that wasn't him. So, armed with this new ninjutsu with a dash of fuuinjutsu for good luck and some body-anchoring, he strolled confidently into the Oinin office for his newest mission, safe in his disguise as Fox.

"Fox," stated the Oinin commander, "Your mission is to eliminate the A-ranked missing-nin Gakura Irotsuchi, formerly a Jounin of Takigakure. Here is the necessary files, and this is an A-ranked mission. Departure is at eight hundred hours. Dismissed." Naruto took the packet, grinning under his ceramic kitsune mask as he Konoha-Shunshin'ed to his small apartment. Finally, a chance to try out his new Jikūkan (Space-Time) Ninjutsu! He packed quickly, and after eating some beef ramen went to bed, eager for his mission the next day.

Before the mission began, anyone could see a certain blonde staring sadly at the memorial stone, his whole demeanor different. Gone was the widely smiling mask, the hyperactive blonde known as Konoha's number one hyperactive unpredictable knucklehead ninja. In his place stood a sad man, one who had seen war, with all of its horror and all of its glory. But there was a certain name on the stone which every day he leaned down and traced with his fingers. He couldn't save her.

Why? Why did that ever have to happen? Why did there have to be an attack by A-Rank missing-nin on their vacation together? It had taken four to strike her down while another pair engaged Naruto. That day, his world had been shattered, and he had gone straight to three tails and ripped apart the missing-nin, A-Rank or no A-Rank. Then he had fallen to his knees at her side and cried. Uzumaki-Namikaze Naruto cried. It had been three days before he had returned to Konoha, carrying her bridal style, covered in blood and tears. Why couldn't he have moved faster? Why couldn't he have gone to her, screw the distracting pair? Why?

As he was lost in thought, the time of the mission rolled around and a small alarm beeped. He stood up, head bowed, and proceeded on the mission, jumping through the tree boughs, thankful that his tear lines were hidden under his mask. It took only several hours to reach the appointed area. He staked out the small camp, blending into the tree bark easily as he waited for his mark to put in an appearance. Patience was a great virtue among hunter-nin.

It only took several hours for the man to put in an appearance. Naruto attacked with shuriken from the cover of the branches, and the man blocked them with a kunai. They quickly engaged in a taijutsu/kenjutsu battle, the fugitive's katana versus Naruto's twin kodachi. It was not long before the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki began to gain the upper hand and Irotsuchi resorted to ninjutsu.

"Suiton: Mizurappa! (Water Release: Water Trumpet!)" the man blew a powerful jet of compressed water at the blonde, who used Kawarimi no Jutsu to come behind him and call "Fuuton: Daitoppa!" blowing the man through a tree or two. He came back out, calling "Suiton: Suiryuudan no Jutsu!" pulling water from a nearby lake into a massive water dragon with golden eyes that smacked into Naruto's face, cracking his mask.

Goddammit!

Naruto began a series of seals for his Jikukan technique, wary and prepared for an attack. So when the other man finished his first and called an unknown technique, that being "Ninpou: Ōbārōdo no Kiri!" and blowing a pale mist out over Naruto. Figuring it to be a precursor to increase another jutsu, Naruto didn't interrupt his seals and when he called out, "Jikanton: Makimodoshi!" all he remembered was a flash of white light and then blackness. Silly Naruto, ignoring the mist, which caused people in the mist to use much of their reserves in their next technique so that they collapsed from premature chakra exhaustion. But with Naruto's reserves, he overloaded his time-travel jutsu and he simply disappeared.

"Sensei, there's a guy over here! I think he's dead!"

"Tch. He's only unconscious, knucklehead. Sensei, we should take him to the hospital. He wears a Konoha hitai-ate."

"Will do, guys."

And they disappeared in a yellow flash, an unconscious hunter-nin in a cracked mask over the teacher's shoulder.


	2. Meeting the Parents

A/N: W00T! I got a review within ten minutes of putting up the story! Yeah! And Naruto will most likely not have his Bijuu Mode or whatever, as this isn't canon through the 4th World War. Possibly still Kyuubi Chakra Mode and something awesome like the Mini-Rasenshuriken or Planetary Rasengan.

And Anonymous Reviewer said that this was basically a bad rewrite of a story called Escape Artist, that I've never read. So I started reading, and... heck. That's creepy. But I don't ever do shounen-ai, so that's out of the question.

When Naruto came to his senses, he was lying shirtless in a hospital bed, an IV in his arm and a crowd of giggling nurses around him. When he blinked and opened his eyes, he had to close them again. This was annoying. He didn't recognize any of these nurses and his mission must have failed, seeing as he passed out without killing the guy. God, he'd never live this down. This seriously sucked.

When he opened his eyes for the second time, the doctor dozing in the chair snapped to attention, saying calmly, "Ah, you're finally awake. Sandaime-sama will want to hear of this."

_Sandaime-jiji? What the hell? All I remember was using the Jikukan jutsu... damn. How to check... Look at Hokage Mountain. _

He supported himself on his elbows and looked out the window, only to see three heads on the mountain. Naruto then swore quite loudly, just as the door opened and someone bounced in wearing orange goggles in a way that reminded Naruto of his younger self.

"Hey he woke up! Kakashi, Rin-chan, come on in! He's awake!" Then, noticing the colorful string of expletives Naruto was saying, he guilelessly asked, "What was that you were going to use to use the Sennen Goroshi on?"

Naruto, finally noticing the presence of a little hedgehog-headed boy, slapped his hands over his mouth and turned red. "Nooothiiiing..." he said slowly. Then in came a little white-haired boy wearing a mask and a girl with purple face markings reminiscent of Inuzuka. Rin, hedgehog-head had called her, and she rushed over, hands glowing green as she performed a diagnostic. "That is weird. Your injuries are completely healed; no scarring whatsoever. You were supposed to be here another full week!" she said, focus and confusion wrinkling her brow.

"Kakashi, do something for once!" cried hedgehog-head, tossing a balloon filled with liquid at him. It hit the surprised mini-sensei right on his mask, turning it bright pink and fluorescent yellow. The boy was laughing and rolling around on the floor, pointing at his fuming teammate, who bit out, "Obito. You. Are. Dead." before jumping with a kunai at him, thankfully held in the reverse position, and clocking him in the back of the head with the ring. That settled things. This was Kakashi-sensei's old team, and their sensei was... Dammit. A blonde head, even spikier than his own, had poked around the corner, grinning with some honest concern after the banging around he had heard. Then he saw Naruto without the mask, and it was freaking creepy. This guy he had found just outside Konoha's walls looked like a carbon copy of him, except with some weird whisker-shaped scars on his cheeks. He wore a Konoha forehead protector, but the elite jounin had never seen him anywhere around Konoha. Interesting.

He strode slowly over to the chair and sat down, ignoring the squabbling students, planning on talking to the boy who was still staring at him in shock. Then he noticed that Obito was going through some recognizable handseals and paused to teleport them to the training grounds. "Sorry," he said to the unknown boy, scratching the back of his head sheepishly, "Obito-kun was beginning to do-"

He was quietly interrupted. "Katon: Goukakyuu no Jutsu."

Interesting first words after waking up, but this kid was evidently a trained shinobi, if he could recognize that technique after a handseal or three. Or the fact that it was an Uchiha, or... too many options. "Hello," he began, "How are you feeling?"

"Like a Bijuu stepped on me."

"Okaaaayyy... So what's your name?"

"Uzumaki Naruto."

Uzumaki... Kushina! "'Scuse me for a sec." And Konoha no Kiiroi Senko began to stand up, only to be preempted by a woman with really really long red hair bursting in. "Minato-kun! Something's up with the seal! Huh? Who's this?" And when they locked eyes, suddenly they both gasped in pain and bent double over their respective seals, although only Naruto knew about his own. Namikaze Minato instantly became the serious professional, motioning Kushina over to an empty bed nearby and lifting up her shirt to evidently examine a seal. Although his hands were hidden by his body, the giggles and gasps were evidence that he wasn't completely serious in this.

_Apparently that's my mom._ thought Naruto through the pain. _Kurama, what in the nine hells is going on? _

**Well... Your mom has both my yin and yang chakra sealed. You only have the yang chakra. And since you can't really have two Kyuubis, she's losing her yang chakra and it is going into its old place in your seal, so now I can try to break free from two hosts!**

_Wow._

"Kushi-chan, your seal is active even without you molding chakra. Apparently... something's coming out? No, it's being transferred somehow... I've never even heard of something like this happening before. Why of all the times to leave did Jiraiya pick yesterday?"

"Why the hell- agh! - is the kid over there in the same condition?"

Naruto, safeguards relaxed because of the rather intense pain, yelled out at the same time as his mother, "_**Goddammit Kyuubi!**_"

Both the older pair's heads shot up at that, staring at the young blonde who had made the outburst. As their ordeal ended and the two jinchuuriki relaxed, Naruto grinned and scratched the back of his head, unconsciously paralleling what his father had done a minute or two ago.

"Uh... Hi?"

00000000000000000

"So..." the Sandaime Hokage began as three people sat before him in his office, a disarmed and guarded Naruto, and his future biological parents. "You're telling me this young man knows of the Kyuubi's sealing in Kushina-san, and his mere presence caused the two of them to undergo great amounts of pain, seal-based in Kushina-san's case?"

"Hai, Hokage-sama."

"What is your name, young man?"

"Uzumaki Naruto, Hokage-sama.

Kushina blinked. Once. Twice. And fell out of her seat. "There's more survivors from Uzushio?"

she squawked.

"Nooo..."

"Then who were your parents?"

"This is kinda complicated, so I would appreciate if the ANBU here would leave for a bit. Even the ones hidden on the walls."

Sixteen ANBU filed out, ready at a moment's notice to jump back in and protect their Hokage.

Naruto rolled his shoulders and cracked his neck. "Ah, that's better." he said. Then he lifted up his shirt and showed the seal to the three people there.

00000000000000

An hour or so later, Sarutobi Hiruzen's mind was reeling. So this kid had half of Kyuubi's chakra sealed inside him, somehow had gotten it from Kushina, and it was a seal even Minato knew little to nothing about. He also was a Konoha-nin never seen before in the village, and he wasn't lying, as his chakra never fluctuated during the conversation. And after Minato and Kushina had left, he had revealed himself as a future ANBU operative who was a victim of a Jikukan jutsu gone wrong. He apparently was from approximately twenty years in the future, and that time's Kyuubi Jinchuuriki. Of course this was immediately made an S-class secret, but still, this was pretty crazy. And to think he previously thought the Council was annoying... Yeesh. Welcome to Konoha.

"So, Minato-san, where will I stay?"

"You can stay with Kushina-chan and I. We've got a spare bedroom. Anyway, at some point you're going to need an assessment to see where you get placed in the ranks. You need a couple days to recover?"

"Nah, I'll be good by tomorrow."

The conversation was interrupted by Kushina jumping on Minato's back and latching on. "Mina-kun, let's get some Ramen!"

Suddenly everything stopped, as slowly the two blondes turned to look at Kushina with slightly crazed glints in their eyes.

"Ramen, you said?"


	3. Lost in the Past, Namikaze Nagato

**Sometimes Goodbye is a Second Chance Chapter 3**: Lost in the Past, Namikaze Nagato

by Kaitan

Several ramen stands being emptied by the ravenous blondes and redhead, Naruto walked home with his future/past/whatever parents. The three of them, laughing and joking, passed through a nicer part of Konoha, and suddenly Naruto stopped. The other two continued on for several more steps before also stopping and turning back to see what had befallen their errant time-traveler.

Naruto stood transfixed, staring at a massive wall that occupied a whole side of the street. A long, tall wall, with a red and white fan on the middle of it.

"_Uchiha..._" he whispered, his voice lost in the wind.

His gaze did not falter or move, lost in thoughts and possibilities. There had been no attempted coup, no massacre by a crying Itachi, Uchiha Shisui still had both his eyes... Sasuke was not past saving...

Figuring this was another thing from his past, the other two let him continue on his train of thought, idly chatting until he finally broke himself out of his own mind, with the difficulty of breaking a triple-layered genjutsu laid on by Kurenai herself. He offered a sad smile and continued walking, thinking of what may happen now, in a past he had changed, an alternate future... which brought him to another point- how could he stop the Kyuubi attack? Stop the masked man? That lay still many years in the future, in the meantime he had an assessment to plan ahead for. Who would he fight? Minato himself? That would be a problem, but could he even use the Rasengan now without raising a hue and cry?

Arriving at their modest home after the ramen glut, the Red Hot Habanero strolled to the kitchen as Minato showed Naruto his new room. "This one's yours now," stated the Yellow Flash, stifling a yawn. It was a simple room, painted blue, with a closet and small bed. Naruto tossed his gear on it, turning to his father with a serious expression. "We'll be needing a cover story for me. A new ninja can't just appear, not even from deep cover, especially one who looks so similar to you and Kushina."

All traces of fatigue disappeared, and the Yellow Flash stared steadily back at him, challenging blue eyes against blue. "Kushi-chan needs to be in on the discussion." and they strode out to the kitchen table, to see Kushina humming and sashaying around the kitchen wearing oven mitts, only to stop and pull a tray out of the oven.

Naruto paused. "When did she...?"

Minato shrugged helplessly. "I think there's a secret storage seal of half-baked cookies somewhere around here that she just puts in the oven whenever she wants some."

The time-traveling teenager shrugged in sympathy.

"Options?" questioned the Yellow Flash around a mouthful of chocolate chip cookies.

"ANBU special ops?" said Kushina tentatively.

"Nah, no mask is retiring now. And you can still see hair around an ANBU mask, and no one has sunbeam hair around here except for me."

"Genjutsu?"

"Too many people skilled in dōjutsu around here. Seriously, why does Konoha have two of the big three and the third is extinct?"

"No sidetracking!"

"Sibling?"

"That could work..."

"I'm an orphan, so the family resemblance could be passed off as something from outside Konoha."

"Stop wearing the headband, straight off."

"Namikaze... Naruto?"

"Jiraiya'll see something's up instantly. It's not a common name."

"Namikaze... hmm... N-"

"-agato."

Both of the others looked at the speaker with some confusion.

"Any particular reason?"

"Just... the name of a friend of mine who died before he could change the world."

"Sorry to pry. So Namikaze Nagato it is?"

"Done." And with this distraction out of the way, the three dove into the tray of chocolate chip cookies.

Naruto yawned and blearily opened his eyes, only for them to snap open at seeing something in front of his face- a ponderous balloon, with some viscous liquid swishing inside it. He cautiously glanced around the room, seeing it filled with a veritable minefield of prank traps, some ropes, and some evidently hooked up to the sealing design hovering in the air above him. Was that even possible? He shook his head sadly. Lost Whirlpool Arts were astounding, but lost all the same by his time.

Carefully making his way outside and to the table, he found a Kushina grinning like the Cheshire cat and a Minato with his head in his hands. "Good morning, Nagato-chan!" chirped the redhead. Her only response being a raised eyebrow, she pouted and turned away, humphing, but letting a smile peek through. "Good luck disarming that," muttered Naruto's new elder brother. His elated face at having escaped them all fell comically, and another giggle sneaked out of Kushina. Naruto- no, Nagato- shook his head ruefully and sat down, reaching for some food. "Oh, and your assessment will be against me," and Nagato's face fell straight into his cereal.

00000000 Part II- A Battle of Speed

Nagato arrived at the training grounds, nearly being dragged by his two housemates.

The Sandaime was present, as well as several ANBU guards, as was to be expected: an unknown ninja claiming to be an Oinin from the future was to be assessed by Namikaze Minato, one of the Leaf's foremost ninja.

Nagato and Minato bowed to each other. "Begin!" shouted the Sandaime, leaping back with his robes fluttering.

Both jumped back, Minato holding a Hiraishin kunai loosely in his left hand, Nagato having unsheathed his twin kodachi, before they charged. The Hiraishin kunai was optimized for close combat and the Yellow Flash began with a blurring backhand strike, kunai held in a reverse grip. It was knocked away by a short blade as the other was thrust at his opponent. Moving with a speed Nagato didn't know was possible in close combat, Minato guided the blade past his side with consummate ease and got inside Nagato's guard with another three-pronged kunai in his hand. Dropping one kodachi, Nagato hastily blocked with his arm bracer, letting the knife dig into it. _Damn he's strong!_ Thought Nagato, straining. Then a boot in his stomach forcibly disengaged him from the hold, and he tumbled backwards several meters before rolling back to a low stance, eyes never leaving his opponent. A small grin was his only warning before another boot announced Minato's appearance behind him, but Nagato was prepared this time. A hand caught the boot and the other was hastily blocked inches from Minato's face. "Better," allowed Minato before with lightning speed he pushed away the two fists to leap easily over Nagato's head, launching a handful of shuriken masked by his other hand. These being dodged or blocked, they began forming handseals. "**Raiton: Rairy****ū**** no Tatsumaki**!(Lightning Release: Thunder Dragon Tornado)" finished Minato, calling down a lightning strike on himself, which then formed into a dragon that charged Nagato. _That is some form manipulation,_ noted Nagato. _Don't want to get hit. _

"**F****ūton: Fūtate no Jutsu**. (Wind Release: Wind Shield.)" mouthed Nagato as he placed an invisible hexagonal panel in front of him. Somehow the older blonde must have seen the shimmer or guessed because the dragon veered, crashing into a hastily-erected second wind shield. It fought against the stronger element for a second before bursting into electricity of which a stray arc burned Nagato's sleeve. "Well... Ouch." And Minato had disappeared again, and suddenly the wind shields dissipated as Nagato was yanked backwards and thrown into a tree. He landed agilely, and formed a pair of shadow clones. He held out his hand, forming a chakra shell, and one clone filled it with chakra, and another filled it with wind-element. Soon a small ball flickering with wind blades sat in his hand. "**Fūton: Rasengan.**(Wind Release: Rasengan)" And wielding this in his hand, both he and Minato charged once more. The Wind Release Rasengan easily overpowered the standard Rasengan, and Minato 'ported out of there only to see Nagato spin and lob it at him. Overcoming his surprise, he ducked only for the explosion to knock him flying, and controlled the fall through landing at yet another three-pronged kunai. Minato looked to the side and said, "Sandaime-sama?" "Yes, his skills have been adequately assessed. You may finish or continue as you wish."

"Okay I'm done." said the Yellow Flash.

"WHAAAT? I wanna keep going!" shouted Namikaze Nagato.

"You sure?"

"Yeah! I'm so gonna beat the crap outta you now!"

But suddenly Minato was behind him with a kunai to his throat. "Nope."

"When in the..."

"I tagged you in the first exchange, remember?"

"no..."

"Want some of Kushina's cookies?"

"Sure!"

And cookies were shared by all.


End file.
